(no subject)
Jul. 1st, 2018 09:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsI think it was coffeeandink who recommended me Tansy Rayner Roberts' Musketeer Space as a good vacation read? That was some time ago and it took me ages to get around to acting on it but I'm very glad I waited until when I did because WHAT A GOOD READ for stressful days!
Musketeer Space is exactly what it says on the tin: Tansy Rayner Roberts' extremely long, extremely faithful Three Musketeers mostly-genderswapped space AU.
I have of course read published AUs of classic literature before; mostly it's not very good and left me wishing I had read the equivalent, better-written Yuletide story on AO3 (I'm looking at you, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.) Musketeer Space, on the other hand, was serially self-published and therefore is perfectly capable of containing all the virtues of a very long Yuletide fanfic:
- Tansy Rayner Roberts very clearly deeply loves The Three Musketeers, something which is always true of people who write long Yuletide fanfic and often NOT very true of people who write published AUs of classic literature (I'M LOOKING AT YOU, PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES)
- and as a result makes the correct assumption that her readers are going to be thrilled to see every single ridiculous incident and minor character in the book lovingly updated for space nonsense (I laughed so hard so many times, I'm so pleased with the sports fanatic space nuns!)
- Lots Of Gay Content
- (I'm not entirely sure whether Tansy Rayner Roberts started out planning to ship f!D'Artagnan and f!Roquefort or that's a thing that kind of happened along the way but it was definitely a good thing that happened along the way)
- a thorough understanding that as fun as the original book is, all the characters in it ... are terrible ...... and, relatedly, an extremely deft hand at keeping the characters very recognizably the original characters while also updating the context so that you feel OK rooting for them!
- I even liked Athos
- I never like Athos
- she even kept Athos a dude, Athos is basically the only person who is still a dude (Milord de Winter for the record is also a dude) and I STILL LIKED HIM. HOW
- this is some kind of magic
- anyway well done Tansy Rayner Roberts, this was an extremely enjoyable six hundred page adventure, favorite Three Musketeers adaptation by far and in fact also beats out the original Three Musketeers due to the fact that this time I don't spend all six hundred pages wishing Milady had murdered Athos instead of the other way around
coffeeandink who recommended me Tansy Rayner Roberts' Musketeer Space as a good vacation read? That was some time ago and it took me ages to get around to acting on it but I'm very glad I waited until when I did because WHAT A GOOD READ for stressful days! Musketeer Space is exactly what it says on the tin: Tansy Rayner Roberts' extremely long, extremely faithful Three Musketeers mostly-genderswapped space AU.
I have of course read published AUs of classic literature before; mostly it's not very good and left me wishing I had read the equivalent, better-written Yuletide story on AO3 (I'm looking at you, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.) Musketeer Space, on the other hand, was serially self-published and therefore is perfectly capable of containing all the virtues of a very long Yuletide fanfic:
- Tansy Rayner Roberts very clearly deeply loves The Three Musketeers, something which is always true of people who write long Yuletide fanfic and often NOT very true of people who write published AUs of classic literature (I'M LOOKING AT YOU, PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES)
- and as a result makes the correct assumption that her readers are going to be thrilled to see every single ridiculous incident and minor character in the book lovingly updated for space nonsense (I laughed so hard so many times, I'm so pleased with the sports fanatic space nuns!)
- Lots Of Gay Content
- (I'm not entirely sure whether Tansy Rayner Roberts started out planning to ship f!D'Artagnan and f!Roquefort or that's a thing that kind of happened along the way but it was definitely a good thing that happened along the way)
- a thorough understanding that as fun as the original book is, all the characters in it ... are terrible ...... and, relatedly, an extremely deft hand at keeping the characters very recognizably the original characters while also updating the context so that you feel OK rooting for them!
- I even liked Athos
- I never like Athos
- she even kept Athos a dude, Athos is basically the only person who is still a dude (Milord de Winter for the record is also a dude) and I STILL LIKED HIM. HOW
- this is some kind of magic
- anyway well done Tansy Rayner Roberts, this was an extremely enjoyable six hundred page adventure, favorite Three Musketeers adaptation by far and in fact also beats out the original Three Musketeers due to the fact that this time I don't spend all six hundred pages wishing Milady had murdered Athos instead of the other way around
